Troubleshooting Campaigns

This document provides various tips to help troubleshoot campaigns.

# Why didn't a user receive an email from this campaign?

When sending a campaign to a list of users, there are various reasons that individual users on the list may not receive the email.

# Suppression list in campaign

Was the user included on a suppression list used for your campaign? If a user is included on both the list to send and to suppress then the user will not receive any type of communication associated with that campaign.

# Unsubscribed

Is the user unsubscribed from the channel, unsubscribed from an opt-out message type, or not subscribed to an opt-in message type? In this case, they will not receive the campaign.

# Send skips

Iterable is now configured to log send skip events to users' event histories. In the event an email is skipped for a user, the send skip event added to their event history will include a field called reason which will highlight why the email was skipped. For more information about email send skip events and their meanings, read Send Skips. Reasons for a send skip include, for example, a user receiving too many marketing emails within an 18-hour window, locale mismatches and others.

# Bounces

There are two types of bounces that can occur during a campaign. The first is a hard bounce which generally means the email is invalid or has a typo. The second is a soft bounce which means that an email was rejected to a mailbox being full, hitting a SPAM filter, etc. Bounce events are logged to users' event histories with data that highlights why the email was bounced. This data can also be exported via CSV in any Campaign Analytics page.

# ESP suppression

The following applies if your team is using a dedicated IP service (SparkPost, SendGrid, etc.). These platforms contain their own suppression list that you can upload which will capture users prior to send and prevent communication from being sent out. This will also be listed as a skip event with the reason code "Suppressed". If this is happening, and you manage your ESP integration, then this information can be accessed through their respective portal. If Iterable is managing your ESP integration, please reach out to your customer success manager for further information.

# Workflow configuration

If you are using a workflow to trigger an email send, make sure to check your workflow's advanced options, as lifetime and simultaneous entrance limits may be in place that will prevent a user from entering into a workflow. These two settings will check to see if a user has entered a workflow anytime previously or if they are currently in a workflow, which may prevent the user from processing as expected.

# Why is my campaign not sending?

# Data feeds

If you see an email campaign that is stuck in its sending stage then one of the first things you will want to check is your notification center (accessible by clicking the bell logo in the upper right-hand corner) to see if your data feeds are throwing any errors. If so please consult with your development team and Iterable's support team to better understand what is causing these error messages.

# DNS configuration

If you and your team are not receiving email sends or proof sends you will want to ensure that your DNS configuration is set up correctly. If your team is using Amazon SES, then you can find your settings in the DNS setup tab, and quickly verify that all records are verified via a green checkbox. If your team is using SparkPost or another ESP to send out email you will want to check the notification center in your project to see if there are any errors related to your ESP. If there are not, then you will want to check your configuration settings via your ESP portal or consult with your team's Customer Success Manager to further investigate.

# Limitations within your project

Is your campaign utilizing experiments or throttling? Some teams use experiments and/or rate limiting to help gain insight into what types of emails work better than others and help maintain stabilization for your team's web infrastructure. If you are using an experiment, you will want to make sure that the experiment configurations are correct, and see which factors (i.e. time zones, send time, etc.) might contribute to the campaign not finishing yet. If using rate limiting, double-check your rate limits within your channels settings, and also check to see which other active campaigns or workflows might cause you to hit the rate limit.

# Is the triggered campaign in a running state?

In order for a triggered campaign to send a message, it must be in the running state. To put a triggered campaign in the running state, activate it.

Workflow campaigns automatically transition from ready to running when the first users arrive at their associated workflow nodes. By contrast, triggered campaigns do not automatically transition from ready to running when a triggering API call is made.

# Get support

If you are still unsure what is causing a halt in sending, please feel free to file a support ticket by emailing support@iterable.com or start a live chat with one of our support representatives.